How am I already on my third census of the trip? Time is going WAY too fast out here.

Today was very windy, and as a result (I think) animal numbers seem to be down. Except for the cormorants who reached an all time high for my counts.

Mammals:

• Harbour seal: 40
• California sea lion: 371
• Steller sea lion: 448 (there really do seem to be a LOT more Steller sea lions here this year)
• Sea otter: 1
• Elephant seal: 1
• Not seen today, but honourable mention to the one Northern fur seal here this week,

The sea otter and the fur seal were too far for any good photos so massive shout out to Tom from Eagle Wing for sending me these photos and allowing me to post them here. I will also mention that these photos were taken with a long lens and cropped, and the vessel respected all animal space/followed the law for approach distance.

Photo Credit: Tom F

Northern fur seal, Photo Credit: Tom F

Stellers are taking over!

These photos will also help us continue to ID the sea otter and see if it stays around. I have started calling him Oswald (Ozzie for short). I figured we should stick with O names around here and honour our good buddy Ollie who is no longer around but definitely made a name for himself out here at Race Rocks!

On to the bird count:

• Gull: 435
• Cormorant: 1,160 (every rock and island was just peppered with cormorants!)
• Canada goose: 10
• Bald eagle: 1
• Sparrows: many, too fast too count
• Turnstone: 34
• Honourable mention for the red-footed booby who I last saw yesterday!

Red-footed booby taking off